2012 Destashing Thread

Minnie-Mickey,

I've been uploading photos to shutterfly and making books that way. I am starting with '06 just because it was handy right when I decided to make the book. LOL But my parents are scanning in all the old photos and cleaning them up using photoshop. I can't seem to understand photoshop so I've left the scanning up to my step-dad. But if you just wanted to do it without messing with the picture I know there are handheld scanners that would probably make quick work of it.

With shutterfly I just let it make my books and then went into self edit mode to move frames around and use the story board feature to place all the photos I wanted on the same page.

Here's the one I made for the 2nd half of '06, just to give you an idea how they come out. It took a lot of hours to make just the one esp because I didn't want to end up with a million pages in the book. LOL
 
Minnie-Mickey said:
Delmar 411

First of all, our MIL must be related. Same here only she would not even let him play with the toys when he was younger.

Second, if you have anymore info on scanning and uploading to make books I am interested as that is my major hurdle.
Last week I started shredding doubles of photos of the kids when they were young. I guess so that I could not take them back
Sentimental is my issue. I have a hard time. Just plain ordinary stuff is easy.

Going to try to list roller blades today on CL. Do people still use them? Or maybe donate them.

I have an ion photo/negative scanner. It is so simple to use. The resolution is high enough or enlargements.

http://www.amazon.com/Audio-Photo-Slide-Scanner-PICS2SD/dp/B0038WJXIM
 
I went through our coat/shoe closet by the back door today and pulled out 6 pair of shoes that haven't been worn in ages to donate. I also went through the kids' winter coats/snow pants/boots to see what was too small that could be donated. I can actually close the door completely now - yay! It kept popping open due to too many coats shoved in there, and honestly, how many does one family need, anyway? I will probably start going through the gloves and mittens in another week or so to see what is missing a mate and can be tossed.
 
The basement is my last major project because I have bins and bins of photos and I'm not sure how I'm going to handle those. Do you make albums for each kid or just family albums? I have stuff to make scrapbooks but have not made many at this point.

Photos are my downfall. A few things, first go through the photos quickly.
Step 1 - get rid of any photos of people you don't know or don't have means to identify.
Step 2 - Purge all blurry photos
Step 3 - Purge duplicates
Step 4 -Make piles to mail to family and friends of their kids/family/etc.
Step 5 - Sort into some sort of categories. I have most photos sorted chronologically but I also have sections for each kid. Most of these are either pictures that I don't know the date of or are extras of school pics, photo sessions, etc.
Negatives go into a binder with negative sleeves.
If you have or are doing digital backups or make sure you have multiple back ups. Websites crash or go out of business, iClouds can be compromised, discs can get scratched, hard drives can fail. I have a binder of CD's at mom's house, I have a binder of CD's here, I have an external hard drive and all of my pics on my laptop.
I accidentally deleted my iPhoto once losing 30,000+ pics. It took 3 days but DH was able to recover 95% of my pics. I have done multiple back ups of everything now.

As for albums:
I have a school album for each kid. Each 2 page layout has a fall and spring picture, class picture, report card and either a hand writing sample, a favorite project or a drawing.
They each have a sports album, in chronological order.
Disney albums are by trip but each trip typically takes up 2 albums so I am switching to Digital for those going forward.
The rest I do an album a year all chronological. I started following Becky Higgins Project 365 but now she is doing Project life. I use Creative Memories picfolio albums because I can slide the pics in, journal a little and it's done.
These I plan to do digitally in the future as well because the albums take up a lot of room.
 


Today I purged DD's clothes and got rid of a pile of clothes she didn't like/were to small/she wouldn't wear. We also swapped summer and fall/winter clothes.

I also sorted my summer clothes and fall/winter clothes as I switched.

All together I got rid of about 40 pieces of clothing.

DH also got the shade and the new curtain rod up in the bathroom.
 
Idea for Matchbox cars. I had the kids pick out their favorites and we put them in shadow boxes. I think I got the boxes at Ikea.
We then purged the rest of the cars.

DSC_0421_zps7d6a75f9.jpg
 
BernardandMissBianca, I just love your shadow box idea. I need to do that with my Disney pins. Your photo solution is very clear, and reminds me a lot of Andrew Mellen's solution for photos.

I haven't gotten to my photos yet. But, I've used Andrew Mellen's Unstuff Your Life book as a great resource for my decluttering. The thing that really struck me was 'you are not your stuff.' Grandma's chotchki is not Grandma. You can get rid of the stuff and still love the person that it belonged to, or who gave it to you. Well, that's a paraphrase, but the sentiment is there. Sometimes I'll take a picture of an item that has sentimental value, and then get rid of the item. And I remind myself that by getting rid of the item, I am not getting rid of my affection and admiration for the person who gave it to me. And, no one would give you a gift that they knew would be a burden for you. Gifts are supposed to give delight, and joy. If you don't love it, or it doesn't serve you then out it goes.
But, darn. Decluttering is hard.
 


I read 30 comic books yesterday and decided that I no longer wanted this batch anymore, so I posted them on-line for sale. hopefully they will be gone within a couple of days.
 
Well, the entire family cleaned out the shed this weekend. I think I might finally have DH on board. We convinced him to put a kids sized pool table out for free. It is in good shape with everything. No one used it much. Problem was always where to put it. Anyway, out on the sidewalk for free all weekend. It is still there.http://www.disboards.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
Everyone is thinking what I am thinking it is too big. Anyway, it did get him thinking that the stuff he though was "so great" and he can't give it away. Maybe now he will be more receptive.
I am asking for a scanner for christmas for the photos. The book was so creative. I love the shadow box for match box cars. I would not have even thought to do that. We have one with pins but it is a work in progress.
 
Banner weekend in the house this weekend!!

On Saturday:
I cleaned out the bottom of our clothes closet - resulted in yet another pile for good will and even more trash/recycling. The pile that used to be waist high is now a handful of purses & totes that take up nearly no room.

DH cleaned out his sock & underwear drawer because (wait....for....it....) I asked him to!!! They were so stuffed I couldn't put his laundry away.



On Sunday:
We went through the clothes in the closet. We are going to WDW on 10/5 and DH needed to sort through his stuff - he tends to just buy what he needs for a trip but I KNEW he didn't need to. He lost a lot of weight this year and nothing in the house fit so we packed that stuff up to give away - some to his brother, the rest to good will.

Then I started to tackle the store room downstairs. There is a whole ton of junk down there. I got rid of a few dumb things right away. I brought up about 10 bags of clothes to sort through. I found enough to round out my clothing needs for the trip and DH only needs to pick one maybe two pairs of shorts. Of those 10 bags, three are going back into storage (out of season or one size too small for DH but he's almost there). We have 5 more bags for good will and of course more things were thrown away.

I am finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. It's a very small light but it's there now. The storage space downstairs isn't in a big heap anymore since I spent some time organizing it a bit and stacking things right instead of things being on end and sliding around when something else was moved.

Next up is the desk - it's our hot zone.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Related to all this...I was listeing to a podcast this morning about simplifying life and of course it touches on decluttering. One of things the podcaster mentioned was that at first it's hard to let go of things but the more you do it, the easier it gets but just keep going and eventually it will get done.
 
Minnie-Mickey,

I've been uploading photos to shutterfly and making books that way. I am starting with '06 just because it was handy right when I decided to make the book. LOL But my parents are scanning in all the old photos and cleaning them up using photoshop. I can't seem to understand photoshop so I've left the scanning up to my step-dad. But if you just wanted to do it without messing with the picture I know there are handheld scanners that would probably make quick work of it.

With shutterfly I just let it make my books and then went into self edit mode to move frames around and use the story board feature to place all the photos I wanted on the same page.

Here's the one I made for the 2nd half of '06, just to give you an idea how they come out. It took a lot of hours to make just the one esp because I didn't want to end up with a million pages in the book. LOL


Thanks! I had not considered doing that but think I will now after seeing your book - so cute!! I have a ton of misc photos that don't really go with any particular event and it'd be cute to make one of each kid. Then maybe one of family shots, oh, the possibilities are endless!


Photos are my downfall. A few things, first go through the photos quickly.
Step 1 - get rid of any photos of people you don't know or don't have means to identify.
Step 2 - Purge all blurry photos
Step 3 - Purge duplicates
Step 4 -Make piles to mail to family and friends of their kids/family/etc.
Step 5 - Sort into some sort of categories. I have most photos sorted chronologically but I also have sections for each kid. Most of these are either pictures that I don't know the date of or are extras of school pics, photo sessions, etc.
Negatives go into a binder with negative sleeves.
If you have or are doing digital backups or make sure you have multiple back ups. Websites crash or go out of business, iClouds can be compromised, discs can get scratched, hard drives can fail. I have a binder of CD's at mom's house, I have a binder of CD's here, I have an external hard drive and all of my pics on my laptop.
I accidentally deleted my iPhoto once losing 30,000+ pics. It took 3 days but DH was able to recover 95% of my pics. I have done multiple back ups of everything now.

As for albums:
I have a school album for each kid. Each 2 page layout has a fall and spring picture, class picture, report card and either a hand writing sample, a favorite project or a drawing.
They each have a sports album, in chronological order.
Disney albums are by trip but each trip typically takes up 2 albums so I am switching to Digital for those going forward.
The rest I do an album a year all chronological. I started following Becky Higgins Project 365 but now she is doing Project life. I use Creative Memories picfolio albums because I can slide the pics in, journal a little and it's done.
These I plan to do digitally in the future as well because the albums take up a lot of room.

Yes, I learned my lesson on back ups when my computer died and the back up external hard drive broke in the same week! Luckily, I was able to buy a hard drive enclosure and rescue both drives.

Love those guidelines! And that shadowbox is a great idea. I have some ideas of things I want to make w/the kids' things.


Thanks to everyone for the motivation & ideas! I now have shadowboxes and a photo scanner on my wish list. We have a scanner but it's pretty slow for the amount of photos I'd need to scan.

Based on reading here, I got inspired to tackle some of my boxes. I was able to sort things into one box of portrait package pics, one box plus of albums - finished & empty, and sorted a big stack of photos into kids and specific events. I still have more boxes but I'm starting to see how things are becoming more manageable. Next I'm going to take the portraits, make a book for each kid and toss all the leftovers.

I tossed a bag of photos and trash and feel much better about organizing the rest now. I also sorted through a file box of papers and collected a big bag of extra papers from a file box to shred. Last night, I went through more papers and now have our important stuff in one box. It feels good to finally start this because I've been avoiding this project for too long!
 
Just wanted to throw something up here that just came to mind. I had a stash of things I got cheap that would make good gifts. Most of them were kid things that I forgot about an just bought new anyways... I just got rid of 90% of it because it hit me that I if I haven't gone to it in 2 years I am not going to, and maybe someone can pick it up cheap at good will as a christmas gift who couldn't normally afford something...Just because it is "good" doesn't mean it is good for you!
 
well sold 2 pairs of pants on CL. Hopefully this weekend brings more buyers.

This pastweekend i was so ready to pack up everything and drop it off at goodwill. I could use some extra cash so I just need to be patient-lol!
 
Woohoo!
I just emptied a milk crate full of papers that hadn't seen the light of day in 5 years! I only needed to save about 5 pieces of paper in it!
I also emptied out a small box of more papers. (all tossed!)
Last weekend I organized my makeup drawer - ditched a few more items I never seemed to use, and donated 2 dresses, a skirt and 3 pairs of shoes to goodwill! :cool1:

My goal this week is to actually finally send out the boxes that are camped out in DD's room (they just need to be brought to the post office...) and to go through my long sleeve t shirts. If there are more than fit in one drawer comfortably, I must have too many!!
 
Just wanted to throw something up here that just came to mind. I had a stash of things I got cheap that would make good gifts. Most of them were kid things that I forgot about an just bought new anyways... I just got rid of 90% of it because it hit me that I if I haven't gone to it in 2 years I am not going to, and maybe someone can pick it up cheap at good will as a christmas gift who couldn't normally afford something...Just because it is "good" doesn't mean it is good for you!

Good point! I do have some things that I've bought and for whatever reason, never gave them. I will have to go through my hiding spots and clean those out too. I don't think there is much but no need to keep it for no reason.

I finally delivered my load of garage sale leftovers that had been stacked in my trunk and garage. THere are a few more things I hope to collect for another trip soon. As I was loading stuff, DH volunteered to go through his closet! He handed me about 10 shirts that he didn't want.

The garage looks much better but I still want to organize it a little better and go through a few more corners before it gets too cold.

I need to go through the kids stuff again. DS has a stack of jeans he can't fit into and some t-shirts I can probably donate. DD doesn't wear half the stuff in her dresser. She gets a ton of hand me downs from a cousin so I need to just move stuff out when she isn't looking.

I'm still making progress on the basement and trying to hard to make decisions about stuff as I come across it.

Is everyone starting to get ready for the holiday season? It will be nice to have projects done before the major decorating, entertaining, busy season starts up.
 
We're going to Disney for Christmas which what prompted me to go through the Christmas ornaments a few weeks ago.
Today my plan is to get out there and see if the little tree we normally take to Disney will fit in the RV comfortably.
If it doesn't I will start hunting a for a replacement and probably get rid of this tree.
 
Scratch the above post. Cancelled the Disney trip because part of our group had to cancel.
DH is going to take 3 weeks off, 1 soon and 2 at Christmas and we are going to have a Destash party.

Last night I filed 2 years worth of papers, bills, etc so now the office space part of the craft room is looking good.
 
Scratch the above post. Cancelled the Disney trip because part of our group had to cancel.
DH is going to take 3 weeks off, 1 soon and 2 at Christmas and we are going to have a Destash party.

Last night I filed 2 years worth of papers, bills, etc so now the office space part of the craft room is looking good.

Aw, sorry you had to cancel. Hope you'll get a chance to go again another time. Good work on the office space!

I tackled the basement again this weekend. I should have gone for the garage because it's still warm but wanted to be able to sit more. I got rid of or put away several piles of stuff that were carried down from other parts of the house and were stashed in corners of the basement.

I collected a laundry basket full of recycle paper and a big tote full of trash. I also went through an old file box and organized some of the closet space. Now I have a pile of items that belong upstairs. :laughing: It's neverending!
 
just filled up a large black trash bag of trash and junk. Plus a grocery bag of recyled stuff mini boxes etc.

Slowly but surely i will get my spar room cleaned out-lol! I posted about
22 pairs of pants and 12 tops. I also have 3 boxes of misc clothes that I posted. I'm hoping to sell some of the stuff, especially the pants. The misc boxes I might end up taking to goodwill by the end of the month. Craigs List hasn't had much action. I hope it starts picking up but with holidays I dont think it will.

DD's bday is in 2 months and my plan was to clean out the garage but I dont think thats going to happen
 

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